So, what if the guy doesn't pay the fine? Who pays for his coverage then? Remember, there is no penalty for not paying the fine.

I've already explained it twice. You are looking at it from a micro-economic standpoint ... if you will. The tax penalty is the carrot/stick in the macro-economic sense to get you to get the guy to insure himself.

No penalty for not paying the IRS? What world do you live in? Stick with me: If a person can afford to buy insurance, but doesn't, that implies they have met the income/net worth threshold for it to be required. They will be afforded a tax penalty. If they don't said penalty to the IRS, their wages will be garnished and/or liens placed on assets. Just like if you don't pay any other taxes to the fed gov.

As I suspected. Quantify it. The only CORE (key word ... see my original post above that you say is "bull****"), MEANINGFUL impact is "the mandate" ... and the mandate is the only way Obamacare would work.

Nonsense .. you are lying or tax illiterate. You didn't save 2500, you REDUCED YOUR TAXABLE INCOME by 2500. Big difference. My guess is you can't even quantify the actual amount in "tax savings".

I dunno. 2012 max HSA contribution is $6250. $2500 might be a little high but its close. Call it $2000. IIRC, fed takes about .30 of every dollar from us in income tax.

That's a tax increase.

Quote:

There is no tax increase. You will (and this isn't even carved in stone yet) lose further opportunity to decrease your taxable income by 2500 by shuffling that amount into the HSA. Two totally different things.

You even lie to yourself! That's a tax increase.

Right now that's $2000 that the government doesn't get from me. Now, they'll get it.

And by eliminating my high deductible plan, you increase my premiums and force me to pay for healthcare I don't need. You can call it whatever you want but that's a defacto tax increase.

Quote:

You CAN keep your health care plan. You probably will not be able to keep your HSA (in the manner you do today). Two different things.

Bull****. HSA works in tandem with high deductible plans. Gone.

You lie

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“If Thomas Jefferson thought taxation without representation was bad, he should see how it is WITH representation.”

As I suspected. Quantify it. The only CORE (key word ... see my original post above that you say is "bull****"), MEANINGFUL impact is "the mandate" ... and the mandate is the only way Obamacare would work.

Mandate is another word for taxation.

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“If Thomas Jefferson thought taxation without representation was bad, he should see how it is WITH representation.”

I've already explained it twice. You are looking at it from a micro-economic standpoint ... if you will. The tax penalty is the carrot/stick in the macro-economic sense to get you to get the guy to insure himself.

No penalty for not paying the IRS? What world do you live in? Stick with me: If a person can afford to buy insurance, but doesn't, that implies they have met the income/net worth threshold for it to be required. They will be afforded a tax penalty. If they don't said penalty to the IRS, their wages will be garnished and/or liens placed on assets. Just like if you don't pay any other taxes to the fed gov.

"They will be AFFORDED a tax penalty."

Afforded?

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“If Thomas Jefferson thought taxation without representation was bad, he should see how it is WITH representation.”

I've already explained it twice. You are looking at it from a micro-economic standpoint ... if you will. The tax penalty is the carrot/stick in the macro-economic sense to get you to get the guy to insure himself.

No penalty for not paying the IRS? What world do you live in? Stick with me: If a person can afford to buy insurance, but doesn't, that implies they have met the income/net worth threshold for it to be required. They will be afforded a tax penalty. If they don't said penalty to the IRS, their wages will be garnished and/or liens placed on assets. Just like if you don't pay any other taxes to the fed gov.

So wait.........what about the people who don't meet that income threshold? They don't get penalized? They don't chip in? But they get the same health insurance I do?

WTF?

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“If Thomas Jefferson thought taxation without representation was bad, he should see how it is WITH representation.”

Nonsense .. you are lying or tax illiterate. You didn't save 2500, you REDUCED YOUR TAXABLE INCOME by 2500. Big difference. My guess is you can't even quantify the actual amount in "tax savings".

There is no tax increase. You will (and this isn't even carved in stone yet) lose further opportunity to decrease your taxable income by 2500 by shuffling that amount into the HSA. Two totally different things.

You CAN keep your health care plan. You probably will not be able to keep your HSA (in the manner you do today). Two different things.

As I suspected. Quantify it. The only CORE (key word ... see my original post above that you say is "bull****"), MEANINGFUL impact is "the mandate" ... and the mandate is the only way Obamacare would work.

I've already explained it twice. You are looking at it from a micro-economic standpoint ... if you will. The tax penalty is the carrot/stick in the macro-economic sense to get you to get the guy to insure himself.

No penalty for not paying the IRS? What world do you live in? Stick with me: If a person can afford to buy insurance, but doesn't, that implies they have met the income/net worth threshold for it to be required. They will be afforded a tax penalty. If they don't said penalty to the IRS, their wages will be garnished and/or liens placed on assets. Just like if you don't pay any other taxes to the fed gov.

Dude, Roberts and the SC took away the collection mechanism for collecting the "tax penalty".

As I suspected. Quantify it. The only CORE (key word ... see my original post above that you say is "bull****"), MEANINGFUL impact is "the mandate" ... and the mandate is the only way Obamacare would work.

So, you concede then that Obamacare is more than just the mandate as you claim?

I dunno. 2012 max HSA contribution is $6250. $2500 might be a little high but its close. Call it $2000. IIRC, fed takes about .30 of every dollar from us in income tax.

That's a tax increase.

You know what ... I'll back track a bit and recognize you may very well be saving ~2000 a year with the HSA. I forgot your wife was a Dentist, so you make much more than the average househould. Making an assumption of 400,000 income ... all else being equal ... my tax calculator resulted in a delta of 2000 pretty much spot on (http://www.taxbrain.com/taxcenter/ta...alculator7.asp ... assumptions: 400,000 married filed jointly income, two non-adult kids, 100,000 wage withholding).

You know what ... I'll back track a bit and recognize you may very well be saving ~2000 a year with the HSA. I forgot your wife was a Dentist, so you make much more than the average househould. Making an assumption of 400,000 income ... all else being equal ... my tax calculator resulted in a delta of 2000 pretty much spot on (http://www.taxbrain.com/taxcenter/ta...alculator7.asp ... assumptions: 400,000 married filed jointly income, two non-adult kids, 100,000 wage withholding).

You're off. We're a two income household. taxes are significantly higher than your calculator.

And you continue to ignore the savings associated with a high deductible plan.

My taxes are going up for Obamacare and my insurance premiums are going up.

But I'm getting no more healthcare for it.

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“If Thomas Jefferson thought taxation without representation was bad, he should see how it is WITH representation.”

Dude, Roberts and the SC took away the collection mechanism for collecting the "tax penalty".

The ruling did no such thing.

If nothing else, since it is a penalty maybe they won't be able to apply a lien on your house or garnish wages (but don't but your house on it ... pun intended ... by playing chicken with the IRS), but they can still withhold any refund due in lieu of the penalty that year and/or in future years.

The IRS will collect ... at one point or another. You won't skate past it.

You're off. We're a two income household. taxes are significantly higher than your calculator.

And you continue to ignore the savings associated with a high deductible plan.

I'm not off on something I never postulated on. I never assumed anything regarding one or two income household ... simply a married filed jointly 400,000 income. Obviously I don't know your exact specifics. All I did was make the comparisons the same, with the exception of the 6000 HSA contribution ... and I conceded it was about a 2000 tax savings for you.

I'm not ignoring it... i stated clearly ... you are an edge case. Deal with it ... Obamacare isn't for or against you individually, regardless of how important you think you are.

So, you concede then that Obamacare is more than just the mandate as you claim?

No. As I already stated, at its CORE (key word ... original statement) it is the mandate. It is the central, critical component with which the entire piece of legislation pivots on. The remaining "stuff" is trivial and in support of the central goal of the act ... which is to improve health care for the citizens of our country.

No. As I already stated, at its CORE (key word ... original statement) it is the mandate. It is the central, critical component with which the entire piece of legislation pivots on. The remaining "stuff" is trivial and in support of the central goal of the act ... which is to improve health care for the citizens of our country.

I'm a citizen. How does it improve my healthcare, doug?

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“If Thomas Jefferson thought taxation without representation was bad, he should see how it is WITH representation.”

hey doug - what about this? How are you going to pay for your socialism if you can't collect?

Not nice catch. It is nonsense. They will collect. The "socialism" will be paid for. When they do collect it can pay for or offset all those 80 or so little ancillary things ruble listed. How does that sound?

See post #376, last statement for an answer to your typical vapid obtuse question. Are you sure you aren't blonde (or wearing a blonde wig)?

How does it improve the health care of the hundreds of thousands of people with pre-existing conditions that previously received sub-optimal, untimely, inefficient, poor, extremely costly healthcare ... for which they didn't pay?